» On the stage

He's a sinner, candy coated...
As a pre and teen-ager at boarding school I suffered through various mandatory stage productions until I realised I could take control and produce (also write, direct, construct props, etc.) the things myself. Many happy memories, with the RoboCop costume (working gun leg) being a particular highlight.

useful_idiot's mention of Bugsy reminded me of the time when our school chose that as the annual full-school xmas production. It was memorable for a few good reasons.

1. Cast. The actors playing the principal roles (Fat Sam and Dandy Dan especially) resembled the kids from the film, could really act and also hold a tune.

2. Splurge guns. Designed and built by yours truly.

To put on a production of Bugsy, you had to buy the script in book form, which featured the collected wisdom and experience (or lack of) of those responsible for staging previous amateur productions. Imagine my reaction on reading that a fair few schools had such a complete lack of technical talent amongst staff that they opted to replace splurge guns with cream pies or ping-pong ball launchers. The challenge was on.

The hero gun was a modular (broke apart as per the film prop, into carrying case) pump-action precision shaving-foam-shooting work of art. Background props were hollow shells over cans of 'ultra blizzard'*. Fat Sam's exploding monstrosity was built by a friend of similar talent - Dan's foam cannon shot shaving foam** in all directions. For final scene on the last night (all-out foam war) he increased the capacity of the firing chambers*** to about 5 litres. Not a good thing. The chaos derived from 30+ cast with guns and pies was increased by liberal quantities of foam sprayed on from backstage by certain helpful crew members. I recall most of the front rows of audience getting plastered with the stuff. Great fun.

That was fifteen years ago. Still have the hero splurge gun. It still works. :)


*non-slippy water-based foam.
**very slippy. Important, that.
***multiple 2-litre soda bottles.

[mod edit: We want a web page with instructions for this. For, erm, well, no reason...]
(Fri 2nd Dec 2005, 16:05, More)

» Have you ever been rude to a celebrity?

As a young lad in Hong Kong...
my younger brother and I spent a few boring days being dragged around the golf course. The occasion? The Hong Kong Open tournament. Our dad, a serious amature golfer, had been asked to caddy for Tony Jacklyn and was having a great time.

So... it was towards the end of the second day and Greg Norman was not doing particularly well. Many dropped shots and way over par. One attempt at sinking his final shot on one hole on the back nine finishes with his ball creeping past the cup and coming to rest a few feet away. Clearly irritated, he lines up his final putt and the crowd goes quiet in expectation. Not a sound from the gathered public, fellow pros, media and such.

He taps the ball... and misses again. In the subsequent silence my brother pipes in the way only a five-year-old can.

"Look mummy, the man's missed again!".

The Great White Shark was not best pleased.
(Fri 16th Apr 2004, 10:35, More)

» Strange things you've been paid to do

smuggling explosives
Whilst working for the M.O.D. in N.I. We built replica bombs, too, and all kinds of dodgy surveillance gadgetry. I didn't get paid in cash, but could order from the hardware catalogues, and had the occasional fun very fast helicopter ride at extremely low altitude...
(Thu 30th Sep 2004, 15:38, More)